2012 modern occult secret service, fourth in the Laundry Files
series. Bob has been promoted to management, and has to supervise a
couple of freelance agents. Seems an American televangelist is getting
too much into favour with the Prime Minister…
This is the book in the series that really started to annoy me,
because it's the one that's a tribute to Peter O'Donnell and the
Modesty Blaise series, and while I've enjoyed Charlie's work a great
deal he's no Peter O'Donnell.
The book is split into multiple first- and third-person narratives,
which makes sense given that Bob isn't directly involved in all the
events but rather is trying to supervise them. It does have a
distancing effect, though: everyone else seems to be having much more
of a good time saving the world than Bob is. (The actual resolution of
events is covered by a quick and chaotic description, then by a formal
incident report, which also reduces the reader's sense of
involvement.)
More troubling is the feeling of repetition: the basic framework of a
slow start, then Bob being sent out on a mission which goes horribly
wrong, is becoming threadbare. The trivia of daily life don't give us
an insight into Bob's character, they just add word count. We don't
even get the general boost in characterisation that The Fuller
Memorandum offered; Persephone Hazard, the Modesty Blaise analogue,
offers some interest, but she's obviously derivative from the
original, and still manages to be rather more three-dimensional than
any of the series regulars.
The writing style is still full of jokey witticisms and catch-phrases,
but by this point Charlie had been out of the actual techie community
for some years. The earlier Laundry books were written from his own
experience of bureaucracy and computers, but that was a long time ago,
things have moved on, and he no longer works in the field. Nor is he
getting good advice from people who do.
I don't have a problem with televangelists as the enemy, but the deck
is stacked: there are no good Christians in this book. All the
religious people are frothing loonies. Yes, I know Charlie dislikes
religion – so do I – but this is not the way to persuade people of
your argument.
There are plenty of things here that ought to work, but just don't
quite, at least for me. (Many other people loved it.) I'd rather read
Modesty Blaise again.
Followed by The Rhesus Chart.
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